Kyle Field
Known as one of the nation's most intimidating road venues, Texas A&M's Kyle Field has been the home of the Aggie football team since the mid-1920s.
The Aggies have always been tough to beat at Kyle Field with an all-time record of 174-148-19 on their home field.
In the 1990s, Texas A&M was dominant at Kyle Field with a 55-4-1 (92.5 winning percentage) record. During that span, the Aggies put together two of the longest home winning streaks in school history.
From 1990 to 1995, the Aggies won 31 straight games at Kyle Field, which ranks as the fifth-longest by an NCAA Division 1-A school since World War II. The Aggies also won 22 straight at Kyle Field from 1996 to 2000.
Likely making Kyle Field an even tougher road venue for opponents was the $32.9 million north end zone expansion, which was completed in 1999. The formation of the Bernard C. Richardson Zone raised the capacity of Kyle Field to 82,600, making it the largest football stadium in the state of Texas. The Zone also brings the fans in the north end zone 65 feet closer to the action on the field of play.
The Zone opened at full capacity for the first time for the annual Texas A&M-Texas grudge match in 1999 and a state-record football crowd of 86,128 watched the Aggies tally a hard-fought 20-16 victory over the archrival Longhorns.
The opening of The Zone propelled A&M's season home attendance to consecutive record-breaking seasons in 1999, 2000 and 2001. Texas A&M drew over a half-million fans to Kyle Field in 2002, easily the most in school history.
Originally built in 1927 and 1929, Kyle Field was named for Edwin Jackson Kyle, who served as Texas A&M's dean of agriculture and athletic council president.
The stadium was expanded in 1967 to include two decks of grandstands, and the third decks were added to the east and west sides in 1980. The Aggies played on grass through the 1960s, but A&M became one of the many schools that switched to artificial turf in the early 1970s. Grass returned to Kyle Field in 1996 and the Aggies currently play on grass.
Atop the third deck of the west side of Kyle Field is A&M's two-level press area. The A&M press box, which puts the radio/television outlets on the lower level and the writers on the upper level, has been rated among the nation's finest many times and can accomodate more than 250 members of the working press. Texas A&M's postgame press briefings are held in a spacious auditorium which features phone lines, studio lighting and a raised camera deck.
Kyle Field and its amenities continued to expand with the addition of the Bright Football Complex on the south end of the stadium. The facility opened in the fall of 2003. It includes a players' lounge overlooking Kyle Field, dressing rooms, one of the largest training and rehabilitation facilities in the country and a state-of-the-art academic center.
The newest addition to the stadium is the brand new 12th Man TV. The structure sits in the south end of the stadium, stands 110 feet high and houses nearly 4,000 square feet of video board. It, along with over 1,100 feet of ribbon board, debuted for the 2006 season and provides fans the best in-stadium video entertainment in college football.
Explore Related Categories